Tom Hamilton Says He’s Cancer-Free

Aerosmith bassist Tom Hamilton has faced a couple of cancer scares, but thanks to the potentially lifesaving efforts of his doctors, he says he now has a clean bill of health.

"I was faced with losing my way of life ... if not my life," Hamilton told the Long Island Pulse when asked about his latest battle with throat cancer. Saying his doctor thought he was cancer-free after facing the disease in 2006, Hamilton didn't take any chances when it reappeared in 2011.

"There’s a guy here in Boston that Adele referred to [Steven Zeitels], who does novel surgeries," said Hamilton. "He was able to do a procedure that got the cancer out of my throat without having to ruin the rest of it. I just saw him the other day and he said, 'You beat this one. You can keep coming to see me if you want, but I don’t think you need to worry about this cancer coming back.' I said, 'I’ll come back to see you every six months from here until eternity, if it’s all right with you!'"

Elsewhere in the interview, Hamilton was also asked to name some of his favorite bands and albums, and took the opportunity to praise Jethro Tull. "I was just thinking about the second Jethro Tull album Stand Up. For a rock album, it’s just amazing — the musicianship on it and the writing," he argued, calling Tull frontman Ian Anderson "a guy who brought the flute into a hard rock setting and pulled it off. Nobody’s really done that. There are so few virtuosos on flute — you just don’t see that.